But love covers over all wrongs
by Tsar Bomba
Summary: She tasted like smoke and smelled like wildflowers and dust and leather and Bonnie had never known til now that her scent was her favorite. Bonnie MacFarlane/Female Marston femslash.
1. Chapter 1

Bonnie had first seen her on the train out of Blackwater.

She'd set there in the passenger car with her head leaned up against the window and watched the men and women who embarked after her. Glanced at the old city ladies in their fine bright dresses and feathered derbies and at the black-suited Father and his young, hopeful acolyte as they passed on down the narrow aisle on the way to their seats and listened briefly to their conversations, more concerned with the heavy satchel resting in her lap. She opened the cover and peered inside hopefully and quickly closed it again. A few more migrant workers and townsfolk sat down about her and she stared out the window at the city and the water beyond as the ferry chugged out of view first behind the buildings then beyond the seaside cliffs. A shiny red car drove down the cobbled tree-lined street and men on horseback moved around it.

At first she didn't even notice that the entire compartment had gone silent. She looked around and saw that everyone was staring at the back of the car. She turned her head and saw a woman that was unlike any woman she had seen before. Tall and thin as wire. Dark around the eyes and gold skinned. She was dressed like a man in dark pants tucked into tall boots and she wore a black thigh-length coat over a dark blue waistcoat and grey shirt. A faded Stetson covered thick black waves that were pulled over over one thin shoulder and shrouded her face. She was heavily armed. There was a large knife and pistol hanging at her hips and a rifle and bandolier slung over her back. At either side of her were two men in suits and ties and bowler hats and they followed behind her and she sat a couple of rows behind Bonnie on the opposite side of the aisle. One of the men murmered a few words and then they took their leave from the car. The woman never looked at them and she crossed one long leg over the other with her ankle resting above her knee and glared out across the compartment at the gawkers. They all quickly looked away. One of the old ladies started fanning herself and everyone held their belongings a little closer, nervously clutching purses to their chests. The Priest crossed himself discreetly. Eventually the woman's gaze swung around to meet Bonnie's and she stared at her with challenging eyes under the low rim of her hat. Bonnie smiled faintly and nodded politely but the gesture wasn't returned. The train whistled to them and billowed steam around the windows, lurching forward slightly on the tracks and Bonnie averted her eyes. She was used to dealing with the supposed superiority of city folk but looking at her she doubted that there was anything city about this woman, just something foreign and distant. She chanced another curious glance but she was no longer looking at her.

They traversed rolling grasslands and a swath of pine and aspen forests. Elm trees solitary out on the plain and Black Foot daisies lining the roadsides. Men rode alongside the tracks, racing the train along the edge of the county as it dived headfirst into the painted wilderness with tall spruce trees and burgundy ferns and the city vanished behind them into the blue distance. Conversation slowly picked back up. The old ladies gossiped of politics and debated over the Indians and the Priest discussed hell and damnation with his wide-eyed missionary. They rolled past the MacFarlane Ranch and into a tunnel that darkened the car like sudden nightfall and when they emerged they were looking out over a bleak expanse dotted with towering cacti that stood huge like giants with arms outstretched towards a sky so uniform in its blueness that it looked to be painted. In the distance were flat-topped mesas and raw red mountains towards the southern border to Mexico from which juniper trees grew from the nearly vertical cliffs layered blue and red and orange and yellow. Horse trails fanned out over the desert like white rivers and serpentined up the faces of cliffs. With the right eyes one could see in the unforgiving terrain and in the violent vibrance in the sky that this land had seen years of bloodshed.

They left the low mountains and as the train began a sloping descent into the flat of the land it seemed to pull the sun down with it. The western edge of the sky turned scarlet and gold rimmed clouds sat before the white sun that pulsed above the mountaintops. The train slowed and finally came to a screeching halt at the small settlement of Armadillo in the true heart of New Austin. Bonnie stood and looked behind her and the woman was already gone. She stepped off the train and saw her disappear into the swinging doors of the saloon with many curious faces looking after her. Even with the strange and unpredictable wanderers that sometimes passed through this town no folk in Armadillo had seen anything like that before.

Amos had the wagon at the side of the town stood up next to the stagecoach and he looked at the satchel in Bonnie's hands and nodded his head. "Miss MacFarlane."

She nodded. "Amos. Everything alright at the ranch?"

"Same as you left it."

As she was climbing up the steps she saw the woman and an old man walk out of the saloon with the music trailing behind them and mount up and ride out of town heading along the southwest road and the train whistled again and rolled following. She watched after them.

The next morning her and Amos drove together to Ridgeview Farm to look at a stud and afterward the road they followed looped around into the feral territory of Rio Bravo where both held rifles over their laps and watched the roadsides. Wolves trotted in the shadows under the ridge and the horses snuffled nervously. They crested a low hill and over the edge they saw the white walls of the bandit stronghold of Fort Mercer and Amos clucked the horses up to pass by a little faster. The sun was still low and the sky was a dusty navy under the cloud cover from which shone splashes of pink and orange. Bonnie saw a dark shape ahead on the road and pointed. "Look."

He squinted his eyes and slowed the horses. "What the hell."

"Keep going. They might be hurt."

"If you had any sense you'd be telling me to hightail it out of here. It might be an ambush."

"Amos. Stop the damn wagon."

"We're gonna get our asses shot."

But he kept going, trotting the horses cautiously down the road where the old fort stood white and silent. No one at the gates or peering over the high walls. The woman from the train was lying prone before it, a dusty trail of darkened blood ran thinly into the road and painted a trail behind her leading from the great wooden doors. Amos halted just before the gates and hid the wagon and the horses and Bonnie jumped out and went to the woman. Amos cursed at her under his breath and aimed his rifle at the fort, swinging it wildly across the top of the wall in case any of the bandits within chose to poke his head out. Bonnie crouched down next to the woman and saw the hole in her chest from which blood bloomed out angrily. She placed a hand down on her chest and leaned forward towards her face and heard shallow breathing.

"Amos. Get down here. She's still alive."

He looked around wild eyed and cursed again and handed Bonnie the rifle while he leaned down to pick the woman up and slung her over his shoulder. He lifted her into the back of the wagon and Bonnie climbed in behind and held closed the bulletwound with an empty burlap sack while blood coated her palms.

They brought her home to MacFarlane Ranch and laid her up on a cot in one of the vacant ranch hand lodgings. She'd lost a lot of blood and shattered two ribs but she was alive. When they'd been driving back from the doctor's Amos had looked at her in the back of the wagon and shook his head silently at her like he couldn't understand quite what she was.

"Don't know why the hell we bothered with that. Look at her. What the hell kind of woman goes knocking at the doors of wanted murderers."

Still, Bonnie had attended to her, checking often to see if she'd woken up. She was interesting to her. A novelty out here. Plenty of men with violent lives but not many women, and after she'd properly seen the stranger with her bloodied clothes stripped from her body and had seen angry scars and old puckered wounds from previous gunshots Bonnie knew this was a violent woman and because of this she always entered the cabin cautiously. For all she knew the woman had gone to Fort Mercer trying to start trouble and had in turn been met with it.

Two days later she was awake and Bonnie had cracked the door open to see her with one hand pressed gingerly to the bandage wrapped around her waist. She cleared her throat to announce her presence and then wasn't quite sure what to say.

"Well, you're alive."

The woman didn't look at her at first. She raised her arms above her head and looked at her hands as if to appraise that each limb still remained in its proper place. "So it seems."

She didn't sound surprised or relieved. Bonnie took a step inside. "How do you feel?"

"I'm afraid I don't know the polite word for it."

Bonnie raised an eyebrow. "What were you doing up there?"

The woman leaned her head over and finally looked at her. Bonnie had seen the scars across her gaunt cheek yesterday and had thought then that the woman must have been mauled by an animal, maybe a mountain lion. But now in the light that entered through the door she could see how straight they were and knew that they were man-made. She was striking, even with the scars and perhaps because of them, dark skinned from the sun, her features sharp and unforgiving but none of the aggressiveness from the train warped her countenance today. The woman turned away again and grimaced as she sat up. "Hell if I know."

Bonnie's lips quirked and she leaned against the doorframe. "Well, you'll be okay. Once you didn't die the doctor said you'd be fine. Got the bullets out a couple of days ago."

"Good."

"Never thought I'd watch someone nearly bleed to death in the back of my wagon."

The woman looked down at her hands and then brought one back up to her face to push away her thick hair. "I apologize for the inconvenience, madam. You should've left me there to die."

"Is that what you wanted? Is that why you rode right out to Fort Mercer and picked a fight with the most dangerous bandit in the county, Miss...?"

The woman looked up and stood slowly, nearly half a head taller than Bonnie, and held out a long hand. Scarred like the rest of her. When Bonnie took it in hers she felt callouses on the palms from years of riding and small burn marks from gunpowder.

"Marston. Jacklyn Marston."

Bonnie nodded. "Bonnie MacFarlane. Miss Bonnie MacFarlane."

"Well, Miss MacFarlane. You may be right. I don't know."

"Why were you really up there?"

Miss Marston considered her words and waited a moment before carefully choosing her own. She looked around the cabin scouting out her belongings. "I was giving Mr. Williamson a chance, for old times sake."

"You knew Bill Williamson?"

She picked up her bloodied waistcoat folded at the bedside table and buttoned it, wincing as it pulled around the bandage. "I did. A long time ago."

Bonnie studied her. Hard to tell if she looked old enough for there to have been a long time ago but this land ages people in strange ways.

"How'd you know him?"

Miss Marston pursed her lips and Bonnie could tell this wasn't a subject she cared to talk about and reconsidered her question. "What was he like?"

"Foolish. He still is."

She slowly shrugged the black coat over her shoulders and looked around for the rest of her possessions. Bonnie nodded at a dresser where her hat rested. "Well, Miss Marston, what will you do now?"

"Now, I'll take my time and go after him the less kind way."

"Are you trying to arrest him? Is that what you're doing here?"

"No ma'am. I'm not the law of any kind."

"Are you a bounty hunter?"

"In a way, I suppose."

Bonnie shook her head. This woman was tight lipped, if not outright cryptic and she decided to stop asking questions. For now. "Well, if you're looking for something to do in the meantime while you're healing up, you could help me around the ranch. Might need someone to come along for a quick patrol along the perimeter later, we've seen some people sneaking around here at night. You could work off a bit of the money we paid the doctor to dig those bullets out of you."

Jacklyn placed her hat upon her head and nodded as if now satisfied with her completeness. "I'm happy to help."

"Not going to lie though, you're gonna get stared at. Strange enough for some of these men to have a woman as the boss around these parts, they won't know what to do with themselves when they see someone like you, if you understand what I mean."

Miss Marston laughed lightly. "I'm used to that ma'am. I'll try not to be a distraction."

Bonnie dipped her head and turned to give her privacy.

"Miss MacFarlane?"

She stopped and turned. Jacklyn nodded quickly and looked her in the eyes with her own. "I owe you with my life. Thank you for saving it."

Bonnie smirked in spite of herself. "Just do me a favor, Miss Marston, and try not to lose it so earnestly. Not sure I'll be around the next time. Try and get some rest. No need to be in any hurry when you've got a hole in your chest. And please, call me Bonnie."

* * *

So my therapist advised I try writing since I told him it's something I like to do and don't do often. This happened. It's something I've wanted to do for a while and I'm glad I did. The entire story is written and I will do final edits and post new chapters every couple of days probably. Genderbent Marston isn't exactly like John Marston, as you'll find out. Being a woman in this time and in that position would have entailed different circumstances and different reactions and I tried to incorporate those into the story. Anyway, thanks for reading.


	2. Chapter 2

Later in the afternoon she saw her from her porch walking slowly towards the main house, one hand resting on her side. Bonnie lifted her hand and she tilted her hat at her in return.

"Miss Marston, back in the land of the living, I see."

Jacklyn walked to her porch and placed a boot on the step. The workmen at the barn and corral gawked after her but were unacknowledged. "Thought it was about time I make myself useful. I believed you had mentioned a patrol."

"Well, I could always use an extra set of hands. Let's get you back in the saddle. I'll take you on a little tour. We'll patrol later."

She led her to a pair of horses hitched next to the Foreman's office. Bonnie had picked out for her a fine dark bay mare and she sat the horse like she had spent more time in the saddle than with her boots on the ground. They rode together easily, Bonnie making most of the conversation with Jacklyn listening and surprising her by replying as politely as any gentlewoman would, sometimes even with an oddly charming dry humor and Bonnie found that her initial distrust and even fear of her had been misplaced.

"You know, when I saw you on the train you looked like you were sent in there to massacre the whole car. Unsettled the whole lot of them, you did."

Jacklyn laughed. "My apologies if I unsettled you. I wasn't in the best of moods for that ride I'm afraid."

"Who were those men with you? Looked like government men."

"I suppose you could call them my employers. Though I say that with great reluctance as my enlistment was not by choice. But that's all I'll say. No need to bore you."

Bonnie nearly objected but caught herself. Jacklyn's eyes had darkened and Bonnie decided that there was no reason to continue the conversation. "How about we rest a bit. We can sit in the parlor and talk a while before patrol."

Jacklyn dismounted her horse, holding her side and she smiled up at her politely. "I'd like that, Miss MacFarlane."

She rolled her eyes. "Call me Bonnie."

. . . .

"Miss Marston?"

Jacklyn sat up quickly, startled, immediately reaching towards her pistol. She froze when she saw Bonnie standing there in the parlor before her looking at her with an amused twist to her lips, unafraid. She set back in the chair, dropping her hand quickly. "My apologies Miss MacFarlane. Bad habit."

"It's quite alright. Your trigger itch might come in handy. You might recall me mentioning trouble we've been having with rustlers and other undesirables around the ranch. Will you help me keep watch on the property line this evening?"

"Of course."

"I want to see whose trespassing our land. Best bring your rifle just in case."

"I always do."

Bonnie picked up her own rifle and tossed her head over her shoulder. "Let's head out. Country is real beautiful around this time of night."

Mauve sky to the west. The stars were thick and faded at the zenith of the heavens where the last light of the sun reddened behind the clouds. They looked out over a blue horizon across the ranch's pasturelands and heard the bellowing of cattle beyond the barn. Thick fields of blue wildflowers and tall plaingrass that grew as tall as a man sprawled over low hills and deer grazed under big oaks along the high ridge of the sloping blue mountains whose uppermost edges faded into the darkening sky. They sat their horses a moment and watched.

"You're right. It is beautiful."

Bonnie smiled and clucked her horse up. With as exhausting as the ranch could be it was easy to forget how magnificent it was in the right light. "Come on then. Keep your eyes peeled for anything suspicious."

They trotted along the back of the main house. At the garden Bonnie cursed and readied her rifle, pointing at the crops. "Goddamn rabbits are at it again. Help me clear them out, will you."

Before she had even finished talking Jacklyn had dispatched two of them from atop her horse, shooting easily and precisely as they sprinted squealing out of the garden and past the low picket fence, dropping silently mid-leap to the ground as she picked them off. Bonnie watched, shouting out encouragements and afterward sat her horse staring at the lean bodies that now littered the rows between her crops. "Hm. Better at killing rabbits than outlaws I see."

Jacklyn gave her a look and Bonnie grinned. "I jest. You're a real dead eye. Haven't seen any man shoot that accurately."

"Helps that I'm not a man."

Bonnie laughed. "Sure does. Much obliged for the help. Them rabbits can be wily little critters."

"That they can be."

"Come on then. We should check out the rest of the ranch."

They rode in companionable silence around the back of the property past the shooting range that the men had set up and past a sandlot where they played horseshoes. Over the top of the ranch homes they could see the glow of a cooking fire and muffled voices. Bonnie spurred her horse and cantered ahead into the blueing night. "Let's get going. We've still got plenty of ground to cover. If it's not the rustlers stealing our cattle, it's the rabbits stealing our crops."

Jacklyn glanced back over her shoulder at the now blood soaked soil, at the newly mended fence posts where thieves had previously sent stolen cattle crashing through. "Not easy making a living on the land like this. Maybe you should move to a big city, become a lady of leisure."

"You think so? Think I should get me some of those fancy dresses? Maybe even one of those automobiles?"

"I think it'd suit you well."

Bonnie's reply was cut off by small black shapes that cut a low path across the grass and disappeared yelping into the corral where the horses called out fearfully and circled around the fenceline in the dark.

"Damn coyotes. Come on. Let's get rid of them before they get to the chickens."

Jacklyn was already spurring her horse up and they cleared the corral fences easily and pushed their way through the gate. Gunfire was now general between her and Bonnie and one of the ranch dogs was engaged in a bloody tug of war with a coyote and a shredded chicken between them. Four coyotes were felled and the rest of the ragged pack slunk off into the shadows howling with the dogs right behind.

Bonnie appraised the destruction from atop her horse. Three chickens lied in limp piles of scarlet feathers and their blood and the blood of the coyotes was splattered thinly over the dirt. "Shame we lost any of them. Guess it could have been worse though. I know I said it earlier but you're a good shot with that rifle."

Jacklyn led her horse over, rifle still poised loosely in one hand. She shifted it and slung it back over her shoulder. "It's something I have some experience with it."

"I don't doubt it. Seems to me that Bill Williamson might've just gotten lucky."

"He wasn't even the one that shot me. Luck didn't come into it. Just cowardice."

They walked back over to Jacklyn's cabin, Bonnie still atop her horse. "You know, you'd be a useful woman to have around the ranch. Not to mention you offer a bit of variety from what I'm used to seeing around here."

Jacklyn laughed. "I suppose I do."

"Are you from somewhere where there are more women like you? Walking around dressed like assassins and armed to the teeth, I mean."

"No. I doubt that many women have circumstances similar to mine though."

"You'll have to tell me about them sometime."

"Perhaps."

Bonnie shook her head. "Thank you for the help, Miss Marston. Makes me think that you were perhaps worth the 15 dollars it took to save you. Get some sleep. I'll see you in the morning."

Jacklyn hitched her horse and tilted her chin at Bonnie. "Goodnight Miss MacFarlane."

Bonnie watched her disappear into the blackened interior of the cabin and shut the door and she rode off shaking her head and felt the edges of her mouth curl up without knowing exactly why.

. . . .

The next day while in her parlor she turned to a knock at her door. Beyond the glass she saw a long and increasingly familiar outline. She opened it and there stood Miss Marston, hat in hand.

"Morning, Miss MacFarlane."

"Miss Marston. How are you?"

"Fine. I was wondering if there was anything I could do to help this morning."

Bonnie leaned up against the doorframe and crossed her arms, lips curling up. "Eager, aren't we?"

"I'm just not used to sitting around. Even on the mend."

"I don't doubt that. Come on in. I'll get you a drink. How are your ribs?"

She scraped her boots along the mat on the patio and stepped inside. "Much better. A few new scars but otherwise it'll be like nothing happened."

"Good to hear."

Bonnie shuffled on her feet, arms still crossed. Jacklyn sat down and stared at her. "You look like you've got something you really want to say."

"Well, you never did tell me how you knew Bill Williamson or what you wanted from him."

Jacklyn broke off her gaze and looked off out the window. "No ma'am, I didn't."

"Hope you aren't offended by my asking. Us folk out here really can't help but try and figure out everyone else's secrets."

"I'm not offended by you asking if you aren't offended by me not telling."

There was an edge to her voice now and she sat there considering her next words like she often did. Finally she leaned back in her chair and crossed her legs and looked right up at Bonnie. "To be honest with you, Miss MacFarlane, mine is a long and pathetic tale, and by telling you would I not only potentially put you in danger, but endanger the individual for whom I am doing this."

"Well, I apologize for prying."

"And I apologize for my reticence. I hope you believe me when I say that I hold my tongue out of respect for you."

"Of course, Miss Marston. I understand that an exotic city lady such as yourself has to keep some secrets to impress us lowly country folk."

Bonnie was baiting her and Jacklyn knew it. She looked up at her from under her hat and shook her head. "I'm no city lady, Miss MacFarlane. As I'm sure you can tell."

"Then what were you doing with those Blackwater fellows on the train?"

"Like I said, they're my employers."

Bonnie put her hands on her hips. "You're the most infuriatingly vague woman I've ever met."

Jacklyn leaned forward and put her hands on her knees. "Let's talk secrets, Miss MacFarlane. What was in that satchel?"

"What satchel?"

"The satchel that you clutched so fearfully to your bosom from the moment you saw me board."

"Oh. You noticed that."

"Well?"

"If I tell you, then you'll have to promise to tell me."

"Tell you what?"

"Something. Anything."

Jacklyn stood up and now slowly paced along the wall. She reminded Bonnie of a caged wolf. Finally she stopped and looked at her. "I can't do that."

"Well, I guess I can't either."

"Quite an impasse we're at isn't it."

Bonnie set her hands on her hips. "I'll bet your secret is more exciting than mine."

"I'll bet not."

Bonnie sighed and looked out the window at the hitched horses. She wasn't going to win this battle but she might win a different one. "Well, I'll bet you can't ride."

Jacklyn hooked her thumbs in her coat pockets and leaned back on her heel with one long leg bent. Bonnie thought then at that moment with the challenge in her eyes and the plethora of weapons and the bloodstains on her clothing that she'd never seen anything more personifying of the beautifully stark and vicious land that sprawled wild just outside the door. There wasn't anything city-like about her and Bonnie wasn't sure why she kept trying to say otherwise.

"I'd hate to take money from a lady like you Miss."

Bonnie met the glare with her own, fire in her eyes. "Is that a challenge?"

"Is it?"

"I'll race you right now, if it is."

Jacklyn shifted on her feet and chewed on the inside of her cheek and Bonnie knew she wasn't going to turn it down. "Alright. If it makes you happy."

"Let's go."


	3. Chapter 3

Bonnie had just finished loading the wagon when she saw her approaching. She waved her over and Jacklyn nodded at her and Bonnie noted with some strange satisfaction that this very dangerous-looking individual had somehow become part of her otherwise tedious daily routine.

"Miss Marston, how are you this fine morning?"

"I'm well, Miss MacFarlane, and you?"

"I'm well. Could I ask you a favor?"

"Til the end of my days."

Bonnie grinned at her. "Could you drive with me into Armadillo? I need some supplies and would enjoy your company. And this'll give you a chance to meet the Marshall. I feel like he'll be inclined to help you out on your secret mission some."

"Of course ma'am."

Bonnie hopped up shotgun on the wagon. "You can take the reins. It wouldn't do for a terrifying assassin like yourself to be seen driven around by a farmer."

Jacklyn climbed up shaking her head and set them down the ranch road and out into the eastern country. The sun shone through a huge wall of pale gold cumulonimbus clouds behind them and cast long shadows over the plains and their own shadow stretched out over the road before them. Thick boughs of wild feverfew chrysanthemums sprawled white over the bluestemmed plaingrass like seafoam in the prairie valley. Curving around the canyon that rose above them out of the earth like a leviathan as they descended they came upon a narrow ridge overlooking the white desert below. It shadowed black by the canyon and it was like a brimstone land. Armadillo stood small and distant. Bonnie glanced over at her companion's shaded profile. Jacklyn eventually caught her staring and Bonnie looked away and fumbled for words. "You look pretty good. I mean, considering you were nearly buzzard food a few days ago."

Jacklyn smirked and turned back to the road. "I have you to thank for that."

"Tell me, have you needlessly risked your life since last we spoke?"

"No, miss. I have not."

"Well, that's a relief. Perhaps there's hope for you yet."

Jacklyn shook her head and look straight down the road. "I wouldn't bet on it."

"I'm not betting against you after that race. Damn near stomped me into the ground. But there's always hope, Miss Marston. You can't be a rancher in this kind of country if you don't believe in it."

"An admirable attitude, miss."

"I can't think of any other way to stay sane, to be frank. What about you? Have you ever given up hope all together?"

Jacklyn looked hesitant. Bonnie prodded her thigh with her own and she gave her a flat smile in return.

"I can't really allow hope in, Miss MacFarlane. It isn't something I think about."

"A peculiar outlook. I can't really say I understand you."

"I don't believe I do either."

Bonnie rolled her eyes. "Oh, stop being so deliberately enigmatic."

"I'm not."

"Yes you are. You are being deliberately obscure and it is infuriating."

She turned the wagon off the ridge and onto the plain. The saguaro rose above them out of the mesquite scrub. "Infuriating. You use that word with me often. Also, you're the one that keeps prying."

Bonnie shrugged. "You interest me, that's all. In addition to the infuriating."

"How is that?"

"Well, you refuse to tell me anything about yourself. Until it gets boring, it's interesting. Also it's funny to me that a few days ago I found you dying on the side of the road and now you're driving me into town."

"You have a strange sense of humor."

"Fits our strange friendship, doesn't it?"

Jacklyn smiled and there was mirth in her eyes. "I didn't know we were friends."

Bonnie lightly smacked her knee. "Oh please, now whose being funny? Look, I know that business with Williamson is your business, but... I don't know. You've been good to us. And I don't think you're a bad individual. You always look like you've got murder in your eyes and you dress like a villian so you can't blame folk for assuming otherwise. Besides, people out here are superstitious anyway. I swear the priest on the train probably thought you were the devil."

Jacklyn set there a while pretending to be focused on the horses, though there was scarcely anyone else on the road and Bonnie could tell this wasn't her first time driving and she could probably do it one handed if she so desired. "First impressions are usually correct, Miss MacFarlane. I don't want you forming too high of an opinion of me."

"I can form whatever opinion I want until you give me reason to change it. And, well, I just worry about you gallivanting around these parts guns blazing like some kind of deranged bounty hunter. Like my Pa always said, don't go waking snakes."

There was an odd tension in Jacklyn's face and Bonnie watched her try and construct a reply that would appease her and get her to drop the subject like she often did. "I appreciate your concern for us lesser mortals, Miss MacFarlane. But I can promise you that if there was any other way out, I would take it."

And that was that. Bonnie looked away from her and out over the bleak expanse that was New Austin. The sun was barely up and the ground was already white hot underneath the dense bottlebrush scrub and prickly pear that near mottled the land and where lizards and snakes hid flattened out in the shade.

"You never did tell me where you were from, Miss Marston."

"I have a small holding up in Great Plains."

Bonnie looked surprised. "A farmer? When in your day of chasing outlaws do you have the time to raise chickens?"

"It wasn't my idea. Let's just say that the property came into my hands by unfortunate circumstances."

"Who is looking after it right now?"

"No one. Absolutely no one. I believe there is a fine chance that I will return and it will have been razed to the ground. I can only hope for such a thing."

"Aren't you grim. And what happened to not believing in hope?"

Jacklyn shrugged. "I'm only human."

"Sometimes you make me wonder about that."

Jacklyn glanced over at her. "How do you mean?"

"The way you talk, act, think... makes me wonder if you aren't a machine. Or if you aren't trying to be like one."

Jacklyn went quiet for a time. Armadillo loomed ahead stark and furtive in the dead-center of the flatlands.

"Maybe you're right, Miss MacFarlane."

"Miss Marston, when are you going to start calling me Bonnie like I've asked you too?"

"When you start calling me Jacklyn."

Going into town they were met with stares. Folk stopped under the building overhangs and gawked in the middle of the street on halted horses like they were witness to some strange medicine show or fever dream where the participants came from lands backwards to their own. No doubt some folk had heard grandiose rumors of the odd woman now residing at the MacFarlane homestead but neither of the women seemed terribly concerned. Bonnie had them stop in front of the general store.

"Well, here we are. Armadillo. Manhattan it is not, but it serves us well enough."

Bonnie swept her arm across the street to their right. "Marshall Leigh Johnson is back along that road. You can see the sign over the door. Over there we've got the doctor, arms dealer, and then the saloon. All the drugs, guns, drunks and whores you could ever need."

Jacklyn seemed to stiffen. Bonnie eyed her but she offered no words. She continued. "While I'm in the store you should run over to the doctor's and get some medicine for yourself, just in case. There's plenty of things out here that will try to kill you and bandits are the least of them. And be polite while you're in there. He's the one saved your life."

Jacklyn looked across the street and nodded, hopping down off the wagon. "I'll do that, miss."

She turned and strode off across the road. Bonnie entered the general store with the shopkeep Herbert Moon staring out over the swinging doors behind her. He raised his white brows at her while she gathered her supplies. At the counter he counted out her money and gave her a long look. Bonnie could tell he wanted to say something.

"What, Herbert?"

He looked at her conspiratorially. "You know, I've heard that woman is a hired killer. For the Jews. You'd best be careful round her, Miss MacFarlane. Can't trust a woman that thinks she's a man."

Bonnie huffed and rolled her eyes. It was as she had thought. "Don't think she thinks she's a man. She's just a woman with an unusual profession for her gender. And where you pick up your fool rumors I'll never find out."

Bonnie found Jacklyn leaning up against the wagon, one ankle crossed over the other. She tilted her head at her and assisted her in loading up the supplies.

"Thanks for coming along. It was nice to enjoy the view for once. And a little female companionship never hurts now and then, given that I'm usually surrounded by men."

"Believe me ma'am, I understand that feeling well."

They packed the last of the cornmeal sacks and shut the back gate. Bonnie looked about the town. "You know, why don't you take a look around Armadillo? I'm sure the Marshall would be interested to speak with you, and if you need a horse to get back you can get one cheap from the livery. Won't be as good as a MacFarlane horse but it'll do. Or take the stagecoach."

Jacklyn appraised the settlement herself and seemed to find it to her liking. "I'll do that, Miss MacFarlane. Travel safely."

Bonnie climbed up and looked back behind her. "Oh, and Jacklyn. Try not to get shot. I won't be around to save you this time."

She dipped her head and nodded, setting off towards the Marshall, wide eyes fixed to her back the whole way over.


	4. Chapter 4

Bonnie didn't see Jacklyn again for another day after their excursion to Armadillo, and when she did the woman had a few new cuts and scrapes and fresh bloodstains on her already dark clothes. Bonnie shielded her eyes against the sun at the front of her porch and waved her over.

"Miss Marston, I've heard all about your exploits with the Marshall. Going out in the country and catching bandit scum. Seems to me like you might be here for the long haul."

Jacklyn came up to her porch and offered her a cigarette, which Bonnie refused. She lit her own and Bonnie shook her head. "Bad habit, Miss Marston."

Jacklyn nodded with the cigarette between her teeth. "I know. I've been trying to quit for years."

She took a quick drag and tossed it down and crushed the tiny fire out under the heel of her boot. "To answer your question, Miss MacFarlane, no, I'm afraid I don't plan on being here long. I already have a life, and other people I need to answer to."

"Is that right?"

Jacklyn lit another cigarette, the motions as engrained and as automatic as breathing. Bonnie shook her head at her again. "Well, I suppose you could say I've had many lives, but for the one I want to keep to survive, I have to end the others."

Bonnie leaned over the railing, narrowing her eyes. "You so do love to talk in riddles, Jacklyn. Do you do that, I wonder, as a substitute for having anything interesting to say?"

"It is likely, Miss MacFarlane."

Bonnie threw her arms up and sat back on the porch bench. "Call me Bonnie, infuriating woman." Her voice lowered and she hung her head slightly in frustration. "Call me Bonnie."

Jacklyn turned her back to her and she stared out over the ranch and lowered her eyes and seemed to make up her mind about something. She realized that there was another cigarette in her fingers and dropped it, half-smoked. "Miss MacFarlane, I used to be a prostitute. I was for quite a long time."

Bonnie's eyes swung up to the back of Jacklyn's head. She didn't turn, just kept staring at a point of space beyond the barn.

"I was angry, I was mistreated. I hated myself and my life and I hated the men that came to me and one night I killed one of them. For no reason at all really. I strangled him with his own belt. That individual was in a gang run by a man named Dutch van der Linde. Dutch had heard the shouting and came in and saw me sitting there on top of him with his eyes half bulged out of his head and his tongue purple. I thought he was going to shoot me. Instead, he took me by the wrist and led me out, and took me with him to be in his gang. A gang that Bill Williamson used to be a part of.

"We robbed banks, trains, held people ransom. Killed people we didn't like. We tried to take from people who had too much and give it back to people who had nothing. I'm not trying to justify what we did, but we thought that in some way, we were doing good. But now that gang is gone. Dutch left me for dead on a ferry we were raiding and I was captured. Something I had coming. And now I am tasked with hunting down my former brothers in arms like they were rabid dogs."

Bonnie was silent. She sat there looking anywhere but at Jacklyn, who had one hand resting on the back of her neck. She wouldn't look at her either. She stood there in silence for a time and lit another cigarette and smoked down to a nub before realizing she was even doing it.

"If it were just me, I wouldn't care. I'd tell them to put a bullet in my head and go to hell. But they have my brother. He's younger than me and lost most of his mental faculty a few years back when a mule kicked him in the head. He can't take care of himself. He'd been living with a family I knew and I sent them money every month to care for him but they found him around the same time they got me. He's my last living relative. We were never close but he's all I have."

Jacklyn dropped her head and scuffed her boot across the wood. "I don't suppose any of this is incredibly interesting to you, Miss MacFarlane, but perhaps now you can understand why I was so unwilling to tell you about it."

Bonnie looked up at her. "No, I understand. But I had no idea. You poor woman."

She was at a loss for words. Jacklyn glanced at her over her shoulder and looked away again. She took her hat off and nervously ran a gloved hand through her hair.

"Even in this new country, where everything is always changing, memories don't fade. My father was a Scotsman, born on the boat to New York. He'd never even seen his homeland but to hear him talk about it you'd think he'd never eaten nothing but haggis and wore a kilt. And he hated the English for what they'd done to his great grandparents that he'd never met. Nothing gets forgiven."

Bonnie nodded her head. "That's true, especially when it comes to money. And you know even now, after all his labors, my father's debts are still terrible. You asked me what I was doing in Blackwater? Had to get a loan. Put the ranch up as collateral. The entire property. What was in the satchel is all the money we've got left, and we'll have to pay it all off somehow, eventually. Pa doesn't know. It would kill him."

Jacklyn had lit yet another cigarette. The blackened ends of them now littered the wood at her feet. She stuffed the spent match in her pocket with the others. "My father died when I was young. He'd been blinded in a barfight in Chicago but it didn't stop him from being a real bastard. He told me every day how much I reminded him of my mother and he hated me for it. She was full-blooded Comanche, and a prostitute herself, and she died giving birth to me. I followed in her footsteps not long after being orphaned."

"But you were just a child."

"Not according to the man who picked me up off the streets. By then I was already tall as most men. And exotic looking compared to most folk around there. Had no trouble finding work."

Bonnie looked down. "You've lived an incredibly hard life. I'm sorry for being so insistent on you telling me about it."

"You know, for all the years I've spent not giving a damn about what people thought of me, for whatever reason I just really didn't want you to know."

"Didn't want me to know you were an outlaw or a prostitute?"

"Both, I suppose. No reason to be proud of either of those things."

"You hate yourself in some ways for it, don't you?"

"I've suffered for my choices plenty. I try not to linger on the past but I have endless regrets."

Bonnie stood. She put a light hand on Jacklyn's arm and felt her stiffen under her fingers. "Don't. All you can do is work with what you're given, and you weren't given much."

Jacklyn looked down. "I tried to leave that life behind. But now I'm back to where I was. All I am is a killer, even after all that. The only difference is that now my violence is sanctioned by the federal government."

"Civilization is truly a beautiful thing, Miss Marston."

"Truly."

"For what it's worth, you're more than a killer. You've shown me that yourself. And maybe I can't say that I approve of what you're doing but it's not like you have a choice. You're a friend to me, Jacklyn. A close one. Regardless of what comes down the road. I want you to know that."

She turned slowly, carefully grasping the hand on her arm. Even gloved Bonnie could feel the heat in her palm. "I am not deserving of your friendship, Bonnie. But I hope you know I appreciate it."

"I know. Come on. Sun is well up. I'm going to teach you how to herd cattle. Get your mind on something simple and there's few things more simple-minded than cattle."

"Lead the way, Miss MacFarlane."

Bonnie clicked her tongue. "And here you were doing so well."

They walked down the porch steps. Bonnie put her hand on Jacklyn's shoulder. "You know, Miss Marston, I'm surprised."

"How's that?"

"Well, I've been mulling over it, wondering just what you were so intent on hiding from me. Had finally settled on the theory that you were secretly a lady reverend here to spread the word of God to us poor sinners down in Hennigan's Stead."

"Is that right?"

"You wear enough black for it."

"Pardon me, Miss MacFarlane, but you're a real damn smartass."

* * *

Had some trouble creating a backstory for Jacklyn that was similar to John's but also different enough to make sense for her. Hope I did an okay job. Thanks for reading.


	5. Chapter 5

"Well hello, Miss Marston. How are you?"

She was standing at her door, as usual, almost common as dust now. "Fine ma'am. Anything I can do for you today?"

"I'm surprised you aren't down in Armadillo, hasslin' the rustlers with the Marshall. Heard all about Pike's Basin. Quite heroic. You're making a bit of a name for yourself around here."

"Well, ma'am, It seems we're running out of rustlers to hassle."

Bonnie smirked. "Come on in. I want you to meet someone."

Jacklyn stepped in and removed her hat. A large mustached gentleman was seated in Bonnie's parlor. He looked like a bull and he stood when they entered.

"Jacklyn Marston, this is my father, Drew MacFarlane."

Drew looked her over and seemed unsure as to how to properly greet her until she held out a hand and he shook it genially with his own big palm. "Pleasure to meet you, Miss Marston. Please."

He gestured at the empty seat beside him and she sat and crossed her legs. He kept studying her, somewhat dimly, until Bonnie moved behind him and placed a hand on his shoulder and he shook his head at himself. "So, miss, my daughter tells me you're on some secret mission to remove some undesirables from the county."

Jacklyn took an offered teacup from Bonnie's hands and smiled. "Yes, you could say that. I'm grateful for you and your daughter's hospitality, sir."

"Ah, don't worry about it. Bonnie thinks the world of you. Way she talks you'd think-"

Bonnie shook her head, a light blush rising in her cheeks. "Hush, father."

"Well, anyway, you know, we've lived here for 30 years now. Came here from the East. The land had never been settled. For 10 years we fought the Indians. You look to be one yourself, or part. They were tough men. Toughest I've met. Then we had outlaws and we had drought, and we had smallpox, terrible winters, cholera. I've buried more of my children than I've raised."

"I'm sorry to hear that, sir."

"I've seen strong men wither and die under that unforgiving sun. Whole herds of cattle take sick and die. But I've never once doubted my life here."

"No, sir."

"When I hear about this so-called Federal Government, sending out agents to covertly murder and control people, then I start to worry. I mean, alright, Williamson is a menace and men like him are the plague, but isn't a government agent a worse menace? In all that it symbolizes, I mean."

"I believe you are right, sir."

"Well, you're a brave individual. Never thought in my day I'd see a woman doing work like this but I guess it's just another sign of the times. Just know I trust you more than I trust your employers, and when you see them you can tell them that we don't want to live like that out here. Sneaking around, spying. It's preposterous."

Jacklyn dipped her head at him. "Trust me, sir, I agree with you whole-heartedly."

He nodded and reached over, clapping his big hand on her shoulder. "Good, good. Well, I won't insult you any further. Come on, Bonnie, we've got things to do."

Bonnie looked over at Jacklyn. "Miss Marston, would you care to join us? It's daddy's favorite pastime, apart from political discourse that is."

"What is?"

Drew stood and pulled a lasso over one of his huge arms. "Breaking in horses. Come with us. I've heard you're a decent rider."

Jacklyn shrugged. "Decent enough."

"Come on then."

They walked towards the door. Bonnie handed her another lasso. "Here. You'll be needing one of these."

They mounted up. Jacklyn rode up next to Drew with Bonnie behind. "You have interesting theories on the government, Mr. MacFarlane. All of them true."

He nodded. "You're right, nothing theoretical about them. You'd know, being on their payroll."

"The government can go to hell, if you ask me. They'd steal a coin off a dead man's eye."

"Miss Marston!"

"She's right, Bonnie. Absolutely right. Now, I don't know much about politics, but I know we're only as free as they say we are. Power is like a drink. The more you have, the more you want. And there's few men who can handle it."

Bonnie loped up beside the two of them as they rode past the gate. "There's things in this country a woman could do much better, if you ask me."

Jacklyn smirked at her. "Miss MacFarlane, I'm inclined to agree with you."

"There they are."

The small herd was grazing along the outside ridge of the canyon. Painted and wild, they milled about and reared and took off like a flock of birds at the approaching riders. The three of them picked out a big bay at the rear and swung their lassos. The mustang reared and twisted around the ropes, hollering and lunging. Jacklyn had already lept from her horse and reeled in the rope and at a dead run grabbed a handful of mane and swung her leg over the animal. It snorted and bucked and spun like a tiny dervish, furious beneath her. She held on and spurred him and finally he halted, legs sprawled and trembling, blowing wildly. Drew tossed a rope around its neck and she dismounted.

"Damn, girl. You're a natural at that. Fine animal too. Think that's enough activity for an old-timer like me though. I'll take him back to the ranch."

Bonnie trotted Jacklyn's horse back to her. "Mount back up. Let's get another one before heading back."

This time they picked a small pinto mare, and she was like the wind itself trying to break and afterward Jacklyn dismounted with blisters on her fingers. Bonnie lassoed the mare and led her calling out and spinning back to the main road.

"Wilder than I thought she was going to be. Little fast ones like this make excellent horses for herding cattle though, when they're broke. Might end up keeping her. Let's get back to the ranch."

Jacklyn rode up next to her, grinning out from under her hat. "I like your father."

"He likes you too. And for that I'm glad. He's quite a character. And picky about the company he keeps."

"You have a good life here. The kind of life I'd like to have someday."

Bonnie shook her head. "Well, we don't have a lot anymore."

"You have enough. It's wanting that gets people into trouble."

They turned back into the ranch, the wild mare fighting Bonnie every step of the way. She nodded back at her. "It'll sap your spirit, and make you poor. But it's straight and it's decent."

"There's no better night's sleep than after an honest day of work."

"It's no wonder you look so tired then."

Jacklyn laughed next to her. "Some deck must be shy a joker, Miss MacFarlane."

"You know, you're kind of a natural at this ranching thing. I think if you could bear to stop to killing people for a living you'd be real successful at it."

"I appreciate that, miss."

Drew was speaking to Amos at the gate to the corral when they rode back into the ranch. Amos took the little painted mare and Drew appraised her and nodded at the women. "Amos was just telling me about a herd just spotted outside of Armadillo. Saying they're big, healthy things. Don't really want to pass that up."

Bonnie nodded and glanced at her companion. "You up for some more bronc busting?"

"Let's go."

They rode out into the country at an easy canter. Rounding the bend over the silver Rio Bravo with the bleak grey coast of Mexico beyond Jacklyn was quiet and when Bonnie looked over at her she looked to be turning over words. "What is it, Miss Marston?"

"I was just wondering to myself why you aren't married. Aside from the snobbery, that is."

Bonnie lifted a brow. "You sure ask a lot."

"Not any more than you've asked me. I'm just surprised, that's all. Between the ranch, and your looks, you're a catch."

She fought down a smile in spite of herself. "You should be talking in the past. I'm beyond my prime according to most men."

"Surely you've had some suitors."

"Well, here and there. A ranch in the middle of Hennigan's Stead isn't exactly the best place to find a husband, and none of the men I've met... well, they just weren't right. Most of them were self-entitled cowards who couldn't, pardon my language, shoot for shit and didn't know a thing about farming. Felt like they couldn't keep up."

"My experience with them has been similar."

"I don't doubt it."

They clucked the horses up and sped down the ridgeline. The land below shrouded by the canyon with the sun high above, a pinpoint of white light vicious in the cloudless heavens, the brown gravel on the trail crunching underfoot.

"Where did you get your airs and graces, Miss MacFarlane?"

"From a couple of cheap governesses Pa hired to keep us from being savages. I'd like to talk about more than just cattle and chickens sometimes, that's all. And after my brother left, it was up to me to become the man of the ranch. He'd never admit it but my Pa's a lot frailer than he looks."

Jacklyn nodded. "You know, for all the value men put in themselves, you're worth ten times as much as any man I've ever met."

Bonnie laughed a little. "You're quite the flatterer, you know that?"

"It's the truth. Every word."

"You're more full of it than Nigel West Dickens."

"Now that, ma'am, is insulting. And impossible."

Bonnie shook her head, smiling, fighting away a blush. "There's the ranch hands up ahead."

The men joined them and the group loped off the road. One pointed out the herd not far out on the layered desert, grazing in the low cacti. Bonnie looked out beyond them. "Alright, see where the canyon narrows? We're gonna drive them up there and trap them. Jacklyn, let us get up there and then herd them in. I'll give you a signal when we're ready."

Jacklyn took off behind the herd. The rest of them galloped up the hills and dove down into the shadows of the cliffs and waited. After a few minutes the pounding of hooves was resonating strongly in the narrow corridor and they sprinted billowing and blowing in, fearsome and white-eyed and beautiful. The men hollered and waved their hats to keep them back. At the front was a palomino stallion and he struck out with his hoof and leaned his neck forward and viciously grabbed the ear of one of the ranch hand's horses between its teeth. The animal screamed and reared back, throwing blood and throwing its rider and the stallion took off past him. Bonnie shouted and Jacklyn followed with her lasso out and they disappeared into the blue canyon in a fine cloud of dust.

Bonnie secured the rest of the horses and minutes later went chasing them out the same path they had gone. When she got there Jacklyn was sitting the pale gold stallion bareback and had formed a makeshift hackamore out of the rope. She waved and trotted the horse over, him still nearly entirely wild and skittering and striking out with his forelegs, calling out with flared nostrils and with his ears pinned flat to his neck. Jacklyn spurred him over and looked down at him. "Hateful son of a bitch, isn't he."

Bonnie shook her head at them. "You'll never have known more fun or fear. He's a beauty though." She regarded them a bit longer, the stallion vicious and Jacklyn clearly already in love with him. A fine picture. "You know, you should keep him. As a thank you for all you've done for us."

Jacklyn looked down at the animal. "If I didn't know better I'd say you're trying to get me killed. But I suppose he's fast, and he's mean. And beautiful on top of it."

"Just like you."

Jacklyn smiled and shook her head. "Yeah, alright. Thank you, Miss MacFarlane."

"Come on, I'll escort you back to the ranch. I want to be there when he tries to throw you off the canyon on the way back up there."


	6. Chapter 6

The country was electric. Sourceless lightning spat out of a tempest in the clouds and flared silent over the rain-shrouded mountains. A low rumble rolled through the land and the earth seemed to shift beneath her feet and Bonnie looked west towards a darkening and oppressive sky and back at Amos where he stood pacing frantically before the barn.

"Amos!"

He was shouting at the men, smacking a horse on the ass as the ranch hands tried to lead it inside from the corral. Rain was falling well now and he couldn't hear her over the wind.

"Amos!"

"C'mon, get them in there, dammit. Whole damn barn is gonna blow down."

"Amos. Where are the cattle."

He turned squinted at her as she approached and ran a hand across his face to chase away the rain. "Hey, miss. I've secured most of the horses, and the chickens."

"That isn't what I asked Amos, the horses and the chickens aren't what I'm worried about."

He threw his arms up in the air. "I know, I know" he said. The wind was screaming now and the rain nearly blowing parallel to the earth and neither of them even noticed the dark rider approaching out of the murk until she was upon them. Jacklyn's horse nearly slid through the mud and she held her hat over her head with one hand while the wind whipped her hair about her face. "What's going on."

Amos blinked wildly in the rain, head swinging back and forth, trying to make out the shapes of cattle in the fogged plains beyond the ranch. "The damn cattle are scattered all over the valley and beyond. There's no way we'll get them in before the storm gets here."

Jacklyn shook her head from atop her animal. "The storm is already here, Amos."

"Look, miss, if the men get caught out there, they're gonna die."

Bonnie looked near to hitting him. "And if we lose the herd, we'll all die, you stupid man."

Jacklyn reached down and clapped Amos' back. "Come on then. Round up your men Amos, let's go get those cattle."

She swung her horse around and he shook his head and threw his hands up. "Goddamn stubborn women."

Bonnie had already mounted her horse. "Come on, Miss Marston. The men'll catch up. Let's at least scout the herd out."

They took off and galloped along the train tracks at the back of the ranch. Hooves clapped wetly against the stones and there was the sweet smell of damp leather and horses. Mud already painted their bellies and legs and their rider's boots. They could barely see twenty feet in front of them. Lightning was now general and thunder crashed like the huge percussion instruments of gods. They looked to the sky like mapreaders as if to read the pattern of weather in the violent heavens. Bonnie shook the rain from her face and her hair stuck to her cheeks. She had to shout over the storm. "You know, I'm starting to think someone up there is conspiring against me."

"You haven't lost anything yet."

"Not today at least. Alright, you see out there?"

She pointed to an anonymous stretch of plain on the border of the forest east of her ranch. One could squint and just barely see the low dark outlines of cattle distant.

"We've got two herds out in different pastures. We need to merge them and drive them both back. Follow me, we'll go for this one first."

They leaned down over their horse's necks. Amos' men had caught them up and some went off to the other herd. They circled them and drove them bellowing and splashing through the grass, moaning mutely over the wind and the booming thunder. They ran blindy through the endless streak of rain and crashed into each other, some with horns locking and others covered in mud. They reached the second herd fully soaked and the animals quivering nervously beneath the ominous clouds. The storm hung directly over them and Bonnie's voice was hoarse from shouting. "Here. They're all here. Let's get them back to the ranch."

It was as if then that some malignant divine chose to test them, for at that moment a bolt of light came down like spitfire, striking a tree and near splitting it in two. The horses reared and their riders struggled to stay seated and almost immediately the cows panicked and took off, stampeding towards the edge of the cliff like mindless acolytes on a death run, all of one mind and one fear.

"Oh my god."

Bonnie was screaming mutely over the storm. Jacklyn had already taken off, running parallel against the herd on her pale horse. She drew her pistol and held it above her head. She was fast approaching the end of the land with the cliff looming ahead, a near horizon. When she made it in front of the cattle she was only feet away from the edge that dropped endlessly into the void of the rushing river below the jagged layers of rock and she spun the horse and fired several times into the air with the cattle still barreling towards her. They stopped at the gunfire, against all odds, milling about in dumb confusion. She shot off the pistol a couple more times and harangued some of the stragglers, using the end of her reins to quirt them on and then they were trotting smartly back towards the ranch when Bonnie caught them up.

"Can't believe that worked."

Jacklyn holstered the pistol. "Me neither."

Bonnie shook her head. Her hands were shaking and she thought she felt weak enough in the knees to fall right off the side of her horse. "Crazy woman. Come on. Let's get them back home."

They chased them moaning along the tracks and into the paddock. The men attended to those injured and they did a full headcount and found none missing.

Afterward they went to Bonnie's house. She insisted on getting Jacklyn a strong drink after their ordeal and she gratefully obliged. They sat in her parlor, soaking wet, whiskeys in hand. Bonnie's was still shaking.

"I just need to tell you, Jacklyn, that was the most terrified I've ever been. You'll see a lot of things, living on a land like this, but that just beats all."

"Yeah, I can't imagine what it would have been like, losing the cattle."

"I wasn't even talking about that. I was talking about you. I've never seen someone with so little survival instinct been so capable of surviving. If I didn't know better I'd think you have a deathwish."

Jacklyn laughed dismissively. She twisted her hair around her hand and wrung the water out of it. "No Miss MacFarlane, I just don't think before I act."

"You're telling me."

They took long drinks and the burn in their chests was a welcome reprieve from the cold. They were both a little drunk and Bonnie stared openly at her companion, who watched her in turn with questioning eyes. "What?"

Bonnie shrugged. "I'm just grateful for you. Can't imagine what would've happened if you hadn't come along."

"You would've figured it out, ma'am. You're plenty capable."

"I'm not so sure anymore. Those cattle took off and I just froze. And Amos was damn near useless. I wonder if you weren't meant to have been here, for whatever reason. I know you probably aren't a religious woman, and sometimes I'm not too sure if I am either, but it just seems like fate come-a-callin' to me. That you're here now."

Jacklyn was quiet. She looked off distantly at the fireplace and held her drink, sipping mindlessly. "Perhaps."

Bonnie shrugged. "I don't know. Don't mind me. I never drink. Can't hold my liquor."

"I can tell."

Bonnie's head lulled over her shoulder. Jacklyn seemed to want to say something else and Bonnie truly wished she would just say it.

"What is it, Jacklyn?"

Jacklyn met her gaze, her face shadowed in the dark of the room and the fire cast dancing shadows over her.

"Nothing, Bonnie. It's nothing."

She stood then, sure on her feet. Not as drunk as Bonnie thought. She leaned over and took Bonnie's hand and held it, running her thumb over her knuckles, and Bonnie felt it go to trembling again. She slowly moved her hand to lightly touch Bonnie's face and she realized that it wasn't just her hand that was shaking.

"Good night, Miss MacFarlane."

She quickly pulled her hand away and walked out the door. It was still raining and the sound came and went as the door shut behind her. Bonnie lifted her own hand to touch her face and realized her skin was hot to the touch and she was pretty sure it wasn't just because of the whiskey.


	7. Chapter 7

Riding back into the MacFarlane ranch out of the western horsetrail Jacklyn was greeted by Bonnie who was approaching at a fast, purposeful walk. When Jacklyn reached her she held her horse by the bridle and looked up her. She looked worried. "Miss Marston, have you seen my father anywhere? Did you see him when you were riding back in?"

Jacklyn stared down at her, shaking her head. "No, miss. I haven't."

 **"** He went out this morning to ride the land and was supposed to be back hours ago" Bonnie said, her hand to her forehead. "I don't know. The ranch hands have been out looking, but so far they found nothing."

"Get your horse, Miss MacFarlane. Let's go find him. He can't have gotten far."

She nodded and mounted up and they rode out, side by side, both of them peering out over the low prairie for any sign of Drew MacFarlane. Bonnie was near tears and her voice was shaky. "I've got a bad feeling about this. It isn't like him to be away for so long."

"Don't worry miss, we'll find him."

"It's not like he's all that young anymore. What if he's hurt himself?"

"Your father can handle himself just fine, Miss MacFarlane. He's built like an oak."

"You're probably right. But I can't help worrying. He's all I got."

They rode on in silence. He was not too far from the ranch down the road towards the river, standing solitary amongst the trees and a burnedout wagon laying on its side, still smoking thinly. Jacklyn stood in her stirrups, shielding her eyes against the blinding sun. "Over there."

They rode to a the clearing in a thin bough of sycamore along the edge of the cliff with the river far below. Vultures circled above in perfect symmetry and Drew MacFarlane stood surrounded by the fresh corpses of man and beast alike and blood had sunken dark into the earth and splattered out about the death circle like spokes on a wheel. Some had been shot in the back of the head, others had their throats slit. They had all been burned to some degree. Their pockets were empty and their belongings ransacked and the wagon looted. The women rode up skidding and he looked at them wide eyed, the bottoms of this boots blooded. Bonnie got to him first.

"Father! Are you alright? What happened?"

The horses twitched nervously on this bloodied ground. Drew looked around himself as if the bodies about him defied rational explanation. He looked angry and scared like this breed of viciousness was unknown to him. "Nothing nice. Rustlers, perhaps. Maybe the Bollard Twins. Now you go back and get the wagon."

"Yes, sir."

"Marston, you watch after her."

They took off again. Bonnie's expression matched her father's. She looked over her shoulder. "What could have happened to those men? And the horses too."

Jacklyn shook her head against the wind. "Your father seemed to have some idea who it was. Let's just do as he says and get the wagon."

"Damn cowards. I have half a mind to go after them myself."

"I'm not so sure that's a good idea, ma'am."

Bonnie turned her face to her, her eyes narrowed. "And you're no better, Jacklyn Marston. How many men have you killed?"

"You really want to know?"

"It's disgusting."

Jacklyn's face darkened. "You never met the men I killed. If you had, perhaps you'd be reconsidering your choice of words."

Bonnie heard the faintest hint of warning and hurt in Jacklyn's voice and she disregarded it. "I've heard the way you talk about that gang. Like there was some twisted morality to what you were doing."

"Don't you take this out on me. You know why I did what I did."

Bonnie nodded angrily, facing straight ahead and not looking at Jacklyn. Her voice was shrill rising up her tight throat. "Yes. Of course. Because that justifies it. You still kill people. You keep telling yourself you're better than them but the truth is you're no different from any of the other outlaws out here."

Jacklyn said nothing in response. They rode the remainder of the trip in silence. It wasn't until they broke the edge of the treeline on the outer border of the ranch that they saw the smoke and Bonnie felt the bottom of stomach drop when she saw where it was coming from.

"Oh my god, the barn is on fire!"

The entire building was ablaze and thick dark smoke poured into the pale sky and painted it black like tar smeared across canvas. Flames licked out the windows and they could smell the scent of burnt wood from the gates. The cattle and horses were calling out frantically under the shroud of smoke and the ranch hands were shouting and ripping at the barn door with crowbars and shovels but couldn't get it open. Bonnie and Jacklyn came to a sliding halt before the flaming barn and some of the men ran about with buckets of water that did nothing to quench the angry inferno.

Amos was shouting something over the chaos. Bonnie was off her horse and stood watching helplessly, her face a mask of devastation. Then she heard horses screaming from inside the barn. Bonnie spun around, Amos was holding his head in his hands and Jacklyn was nowhere in sight and Bonnie just watched the flames as they whipped higher and higher, consuming the wood. If they didn't kill it soon it would spread over the entire ranch and then there would be nothing but Bonnie felt nothing but defeat.

Then the doors were shoved open from the inside. The smoke that poured out was oppressive in its thickness and volume and it hung over them like a shroud. The fire spilled out along the frame and standing blackened in the doorway was Jacklyn, her arm covering her mouth. She staggered forward like a witness called forth directly from the flames. Bonnie ran in immediately and Jacklyn reached for her and grasped her arm and forced her back.

There was too much smoke and Bonnie reeled, choking. Jacklyn turned back into the barn and disappeared into the murk. Two of the horses ran out of there like ghosts called from the fog and when part of the barn burned away and collapsed before the door Jacklyn rode the last one out wild-eyed and bucking with its tail on fire to the corral. Once outside she nearly fell off her scorched mount and she stood amongst the reeling horses and leaned over her knees, staggering about choking and coughing, her throat raw. Bonnie emerged and nearly hit her at a full run, taking her in her arms and holding her close and they both went down to the ground on their knees, their faces and hands smeared black and Jacklyn wheezing and sputtering into Bonnie's hair, her eyes burning. The men were fighting the fire properly now and tending the injured horses and the two of them sat there amidst the chaos, oblivious.

"You foolish, stupid, incredible idiot. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry for what I said."

Jacklyn coughed out something that sounded akin to "you were right" and Bonnie sat there embracing her, her face buried in her neck, scolding her, clutching her while she got back the air stolen from her by the sucking flames. Why she was so upset she wasn't sure but what she did know was that once again she had nearly lost her closest friend to foolishness.

"Stop being so damn stupid Jackyn Marston."

Jacklyn choked out a pained laugh. She coughed a few more times and finally got the words out. "My stupidity has saved your ass a few times."

Bonnie shook her head and held her closer. Jacklyn sat there a while, leaning into her, her lungs raw and her breath a hiss. "I'm sorry Bonnie. This is my fault."

Bonnie shook her head. "Stop talking. Your voice sounds godawful."

"It's my fault."

"It's not your damn fault."

Jacklyn tried to pull away. "No. They wouldn't have done this if you hadn't helped me."

"Then it's my fault for helping you, you fool woman."

Bonnie brought her closer and tried to muffle her mouth against her neck. She didn't want to hear apologies, not after the awful things Bonnie had said to her, but Jacklyn refused to cooperate.

"Bonnie, I'm sorry."

"I don't want to hear it. Quiet now. Just sit here."

They sat there, smoke drifting over the ground, the both of them painted black, Jacklyn's chest rattling as she wheezed out unheeded apologies.

* * *

I had some trouble figuring out how to write this chapter so I hope it came across alright. Thanks everyone who has read, reviewed, followed, and favorited. I wasn't expecting many reads on this when I was writing it but I appreciate everyone that has checked it out. Have a good one.


	8. Chapter 8

Within the course of the next week Jacklyn Marston was seen at the ranch only one time by one of the men, and it was in passing on her way somewhere east of the property. Only town out that way was Thieves Landing and what she was doing out there Bonnie hadn't the faintest idea but she felt her absence and she knew it was guilt that kept her away. After the fire she'd stood there surveying the barn which smoldered under the veil of smoke and then she left without a word, the anger and self-loathing and remorse on her face barely hidden. Bonnie had not seen her since but she had heard rumors of gunfights and gravedigging and wild cliffside horseraces from the ranch hands and her name was often mentioned in these recallings. Bonnie was grateful to hear that she yet lived but gone was her companion and gone were the mostly one-sided discussions they had while on patrol together and she rode those fencelines alone now.

However, she was not aware of the consequences of her alliance, falsely assuming that the burning of the barn was the worst that could be offered as means of retaliation, and events happened that do happen in violent situations such as this. One night the sky was starless and there was a great void in the heavens and even the mournful moon had gone into hiding behind a celestial shroud that blackened the earth and silenced the country. The only sound around her was the clinking of her saddle and the quietness was oppressive and heavy. In the pale mountains she watched bats come flying by the hundreds out of a flute of rock and fly off shrieking like tiny winged demons called up directly from the depths and then they dissipated into the night and then there was silence once more.

Bonnie didn't notice when they snuck up on her, crouched dark in the plaingrass, stalking quietly as wildcats. One of them leapt out of the brush and grabbed her horse by the bridle and another pulled her off the animal and stuffed a rag in her mouth. She flailed her arms and legs and kicked out, feeling bone shift under her heel. One of them groaned and cursed and then she went limp as he clocked her once hard on the side of the head with his fist, dazed in the pitched dark. She couldn't see their faces but she could smell the filth on them. They bound her wrists and ankles and leered over her and put her on the back of one of their horses. She lay over his rump bound to the saddle by rope and they went off into the night, by the hoofbeats she counted maybe three or four horses and they were met by many more on the way to their destination. Bound as she was any attempt to struggle was futile and eventually she laid still thumping up and down over the rear of her mount. Her kidnappers traveled back roads and directly over the country, riding as the crow flew and avoiding the main road for fear of citizenry. The whole trip was shrouded in blackness and no one talked the entire way and all she could see at this angle over the rear of the horse was an aerial view of the desert floor.

The ride was long and horrible, her belly was sore from what had been a jostling and unforgiving trek and eventually the horde slowed and crossed a short wooden bridge over a narrow crag and Bonnie knew where they were. The town of Tumbleweed lay before them in ruins. The houses leaned sideways near stripped of their nails and the wood was rotten and the paint stripped peeling by sun and wind and the settlement was well on its way to being reclaimed by the land. They rode up to a decrepit manor at the top of a low hill, the stone walls crumbling around it. It sat grey and faceless in the dark gloom and the windows were all broken. They pulled her roughly from the horse and hauled her inside and set her down in a wood chair just inside the door where they tied her. She started screaming and cursing them and one of the brought a knee up and got her in the belly, knocking the wind out of her. Then he slapped her while she leaned doubled over and he put his stinking, greasy face up to her own.

"I'm gonna take the rag out of your mouth. You try hollerin' again and I'll shove it down your goddamn throat, you get me?"

She nodded mutely. He ripped it out and she spat and called them cowards. He shook his head at her. "No use in screamin'. Ain't no one out here anyway. It's just you, and all of us."

Bonnie looked around, there were at least ten men leering at her in this room and she could hear more upstairs and in the kitchen and moving around in the basement. The house smelled of sweat and urine and decay and rotting wood. She pulled at the ropes uselessly. The man grabbed her by the chin and made her look him in the eyes. These were Williamson's boys. There was no unifying factor in their outfits or age or race but they all had that same rabid, vicious look about them and she didn't know any other gang that would have targeted her directly.

"A lot of us are real unhappy with you, Miss MacFarlane. Never would've given you any trouble at all if you would have just let that she-devil bitch Marston die on the side of the road like she was supposed to."

Bonnie tried to get out of his grasp but he grabbed her hair and pulled back hard. "So, you're gonna spend a little time with us now, and you're gonna be real friendly, else these boys might be inclined to take some of their anger and loneliness out on you. You understand?"

She spat in his face and he hit her hard across the jaw. She spat out a little blood and he pulled a knife and cut open her shirt slicing her chest shallowly and stared at her. He nodded. "Best behave yourself now, Miss MacFarlane. Best behave."

The night passed slowly. At all hours men came by to croon at her and grab at her with their filthy hands and make threats that they never carried out. Soon they were staggering by reeking of alcohol and in the darkest of night they fired their pistols drunkenly at the ceiling and out the busted windows and they passed out about her on the floor, on the molded couches. She could only tell the hour by the angle of the thin pale rows of light that fell through the slats of the planks boarded over the windows. There was refuse and broken glass all over the place and thick dust on all surfaces and it floated glowing in the air white like pollen.

In the pale grey morning they moved about her cleaning their weapons and loading them up and some of them had sticks of dynamite and others prepared rows of Molotovs and put them in crates and carried them outside. Finally one of them untied Bonnie from the chair and she stood stiffly white he bound her wrists behind her back. They pushed her out blinking into the pale morning with whispy clouds spread out along the horizon while golden pillars billowed out of the cumulonimbus before the sun. The men were in a foul mood and they pushed and shoved her down the hill, her falling and bloodying her knees against the stones and she cursed at them and they laughed and hauled her up roughly by the arm.

When she saw the gallows and the noose hanging solemnly from the scaffolding she dug her heels into the dirt and squirmed and the thug who had spoken to her last night pressed the barrel of his pistol into her temple and she stilled.

"Best cooperate, Miss MacFarlane. We've been rather hospitable with you but if you keep fucking around we aren't above getting rude."

He shoved her up and stepped her on a stool and pulled the noose around her neck. The rope was already taut and she knew that if the stool was removed her neck wouldn't break. She'd hang there til she ran out of air and that would be that and she wasn't sure if she found relief in that knowledge. The same man stayed there with her and readied his weapons and the rest spread out over the town, a firearm in one hand and a bottle or stick of dynamite in the other or stuck in their belts. Some crouched on the tops of roofs, some peeked out behind corners and some rested their rifles on windowsills and crates, all facing towards the front of the town and the church that stood there furtive in the predawn. She swallowed. They had all gone silent.

About twenty tense minutes passed like this. The sun was over the mountains now and hung hidden behind the cloudcover like an unwilling witness. Crows perched like dark bishops on the rooftops, ruffling their feathers and cawing. Finally one of the sentries called out and the men all clutched their weapons and stared down the sights like snipers. Three of the men walked towards the front of town and disappeared behind the houses near the ruins of the church and cemetery. Their voices were muffled over the rooftops and then she heard shouting and sudden gunfire and then the three men were staggering back behind the crooked wrought iron fence and they fell lifeless and Bonnie started screaming. The thug whacked on the backs of her legs to shut her up and she heard a voice call for her and it was a voice she knew well and she screamed louder yet.

Gunfire was general and smoke hung thick over the town. The bandits were falling back and she caught sight of the Marshall and his deputies sprinting from cover to cover and firing wildly. Now and then there was the boom of dynamite or the breaking of glass and fire was now spreading quickly over the ruins. Then Bonnie saw her, sprinting towards them at a dead run, sliding behind the leaning waterwell in the center of town and popping up to shoot a man point blank in between the eyes. Her handler whooped when he saw Jacklyn and he made sure she was looking when he kicked the stool out from Bonnie's feet and let her drop. The tightness around her throat was oppressive and she flailed her legs uselessly in the air and felt a mounting pressure behind her eyes. Time slowed. It felt like she hung there strangling for a lifetime. Her vision was going dark. Jacklyn was blurred and distant but Bonnie could see her eyes and she saw death and fury, fully unbridled and relentless. She recalled once comparing her to a wolf and only now saw why she had and she finally understood in that moment why folk were afraid of Jacklyn Marston. There were two bandits running at her, firing wildly. She swung her arm and dispatched both of them and then was aiming her pistol at Bonnie, staring right at her down the sights. Wood exploded in a cloud of splinters behind her and Bonnie watched a mist of blood bloom from her shoulder but her hand stayed steady. She fired. The rope snapped and Bonnie heard the bullet pass by and disappear into the desert as she fell. She looked to her right and saw the thug drop right after her, blood spurting scarlet from his throat. Bonnie looked up, her vision blurred, gasping and choking. Jacklyn just seemed to appear before her, cutting the binds around her wrists and sliding around to hold her by the arms.

"Bonnie?"

Bonnie tried to fall forward but Jacklyn held her at arm's length. She held her throat and coughed and coughed. Finally she got out the words, "what the hell took you so long?"

Jacklyn stared at her. "Wasn't like you were helping me out."

She hunched over, drawing in shallow, painful breaths. "If you think, if you think that I am going to lower myself by making a joke about being all tied up... you have another thing coming."

Jacklyn didn't laugh. She just set there on her knees staring at Bonnie and her blackened eyes and at the splattered blood on her. She didn't even seem to notice the bullet in her own shoulder. The deputies were running about looking for any survivors and now and then a gunshot would boom out and eventually the groans of the dying ceased. Vultures were already circling. Jacklyn helped Bonnie stand up and she reached for her but Jacklyn handed her off to the Marshall and now she wouldn't look at her. "Get her home."

Her voice was tight. Bonnie looked at her face and it was dark and none of the viciousness she had seen in her eyes had subsided. They mounted up and Bonnie clung to the Marshall's back from atop his horse and looking back as they rode away she saw Jacklyn standing over the man that hung her. He was still alive and laughing at her through the hole in his throat. She shot him in the face and stared at him prone on the ground and then shot him again and again and when she finally ran out of bullets she commenced to kicking him and she was still pulping his head furiously when she finally faded out of Bonnie's sight.


	9. Chapter 9

Bonnie stayed heavily drugged for around three days. Drew had insisted on it after he'd seen her beaten and seen the bruise that looped her neck. That whole time she stayed in bed and he rarely left her side and only once did she wake and she thought she saw a tall and thin form standing over her like the reaper but she passed right back out.

On the fourth day she opened her eyes and kept them open. The room was dark and empty. She lay there staring out her window at the ranch road below and watched the wagons and horses pass by mutely. She said a few words to herself and tested her voice. Drew opened the door and saw her lying there and she sat up wincing and peered at him through sleep-narrowed eyes and he smiled a little and said he'd bring her warm tea and then he closed the door before she could say anything. When he returned he sat on the end of her bed while she drank. He'd sweetened it with honey like she liked it and it felt good on her throat and when she thanked him her voice was already better.

"How long was I out?"

"A few days. Don't talk too much. You still don't sound so good."

"I'm fine. Did I miss anything? Is the ranch alright?"

"Ranch is fine Bonnie. Just fine. Don't worry yourself."

She set back in the pillows, holding her mug. He stared at her and shook his head slowly.

"What, Pa?"

"You had us so worried. So worried. I didn't even know what to do with myself. Wouldn't know what to do if-"

"Father, I'm fine."

"If those men had.. well, if they'd done more than they did I would've killed them. No doubt about it. Don't care if it would've killed me."

He looked angry but mostly he looked tired. There was a darkness under his eyes and Bonnie doubted he'd slept much at all the last few days. She shook her head at him. "Glad you don't have to."

"I'd thought Marston had something to do with you being missing, but when I told her you were gone I'd never seen someone look so furious. Knew it couldn't have been her. Always did. Just didn't know who else to blame."

"She was shot, is she alright?"

Drew shrugged. "She didn't mention it, so I guess so."

"That doesn't surprise me."

"She came by once. You were still asleep."

"I think I remember."

He nodded. "You've been in and out a lot these last few days."

They were quiet. He took her empty mug but stayed sitting there. "I'm glad you're alright, Bonnie."

"Me too, Pa."

He sat there for a long time just looking at her. He seemed to be choosing words. He worked his mouth and looked at his hands. "Listen. I don't know if this is the best time to talk you about this, but we don't see each other all that often, with you always working, and since you're half-drugged I suppose this might be as good a time as any."

"What is it?"

He cleared his throat. Still kept his eyes from her's. "Your mother would have been better at this sort of thing than I am, bless her."

"Father, just say it."

"Well,"

She gestured impatiently and he huffed and ran a hand behind his neck. "Well, I'll just put it out there then. I've seen the way you look at that Marston woman. You've never looked at anyone like that before."

Bonnie felt her hear hammering in her chest and heard it in her ears. Her face paled a little. "No, Pa, it isn't-"

"Now hold on, just listen. I won't pretend to understand it. Ain't my place. I just.. I never thought anyway that I'd meet a man good enough for you. And I just want to say that it's okay if that's the way it's going to be. She's a good woman. She's capable and she's protective and loyal and she's crazy for you. You can see it."

She was gaping at him. He took her hand in his palm and held it tight. "Bonnie, I just want you happy. That's all. Life ain't long enough to not do what makes you happy. You work harder than anyone I know. You deserve it."

She sat there a moment in silence and then threw her arms around his neck and cried. She was still tired. Her body hurt. She'd never known til this moment just what she felt for Jacklyn Marston and it had taken her father, a man she assumed to be as much as an old-timer as most men his age, for her to realize it. He held her and patted her back and when they broke away she wiped her face on the back of her hand.

"Hard to believe you figured it out before I did," she said, shaking her head and sniffing. He tucked some of her hair behind her ear and smiled under his moustache. "Course I knew. You're my little girl. Always will be."

* * *

The ranch dogs announced Jacklyn's return four days later. Around noon her wagon came crashing in from the east. They'd come from Thieves Landing and the wagon was riddled with bulletholes and splashed with mud. Bonnie watched from her porch as they approached and Jacklyn offered a quick nod when she saw her and then looked away. The now riderless horses of the men they'd killed with trailing reins and with blood splattered on their rumps followed them in and milled about the ranch and took off bucking south to plains with their saddles on their sides. The man at the reins of the wagon was filthy and brown stains ran down his shirt. He drove like he was drunk. They stopped in front of the general store and Bonnie could hear them cursing back and forth at each other as Jacklyn climbed down and then the man drove off with the wagon, which was loaded with blue, government issue ammunition boxes. Bonnie shook her head and approached and Jacklyn seemed to be looking everywhere but at her. She looked haggard. Her cheeks were sunken. Bonnie stopped a few feet from her and crossed her arms. "Miss Marston."

She nodded politely. "Hello, Miss MacFarlane. How are you?"

Her face was expressionless, her voice flat. Bonnie squinted at her, hoping the sun could speak for the nervous blush livid over her chest. "Fine, I'm just fine."

"Is that so?"

"Why wouldn't I be?"

"You were hung."

Bonnie kicked at the dirt with the toe of her boot. "Nearly hung. I recall you shooting the rope. Quite an impressive feat Miss Marston."

Jacklyn said nothing. Bonnie sighed nervously. "How are you?"

"Fine, ma'am."

"That so?"

"Why wouldn't I be?"

"You were shot."

"Oh. Not the first time. Won't be the last."

"Who was the fine specimen that drove you in?"

Jacklyn looked over her shoulder at the retreating wagon. "A man I'm ashamed to associate myself with, to be honest Miss MacFarlane. But I suppose I could say that about most of my allies. With you as the exception, of course."

"Flattering as always."

Jacklyn didn't say anything. Just stood there looking like she was waiting for Bonnie to dismiss her.

"Listen, Miss Marston, is there any chance I could speak to you for just a moment?"

Jacklyn looked around. "Something wrong with the ranch?"

"Heh. Nothing so simple, I'm afraid."

They walked into the ruins of the barn, Jacklyn lingering behind uncertainly. The wood was blackened and it still smelled of fire and burnt metal. The paint had melted and pooled at the floor where it had dried.

"This place looks like it's fit to collapse."

Bonnie held herself between her arms. Jacklyn's face was shaded in the dark and Bonnie could only see her eyes glinting in the shadows and in those eyes she saw apprehension. "Bonnie, I-"

Bonnie leaned forward and grabbed the lapels of her coat and slanted her lips against hers. They fell back against the wall of the barn and Jacklyn scrambled to stay standing but all Bonnie could do was hold on and kiss her and she was so focused on keeping her there she didn't even realize at first that Jacklyn was kissing her back.

Her lips were as dry as Bonnie had imagined them and they were rough against her own. She tasted like smoke and she smelled like wildflowers and dust and leather and Bonnie hadn't known until that moment that her scent was her favorite scent. They finally pulled away from each other, breathing hard. Bonnie leaned her forehead against Jacklyn's and stood there on her toes, still pressing her back against the wall.

"I think I've wanted to do that for a time."

Jacklyn didn't say anything. She leaned back and Bonnie felt her pulling away. "Jacklyn?"

"I can't do this to you."

Bonnie felt a numbess. She let her go. "I thought-"

Jacklyn almost looked panicky. She turned away and pushed herself off the wall. "Bonnie."

"Why not."

"I can't."

"You can't tell me you don't feel it too."

"It doesn't matter. I can't."

Bonnie felt the blood rush back to her face. Mortification. Regret. Anger. She felt them all. And on top of it Jacklyn wouldn't even look at her. Tears were starting to pool in her eyes and she tried to fight them down. "Why the hell not."

"Bonnie."

"Look at me dammit."

And she did. She spun around and stood right before Bonnie and she found herself in the same position Jacklyn had been in moments before, only this time she almost felt afraid beneath the woman towering above her. Her voice was a low hiss.

"I am a murderer. Before that I was a whore and I couldn't even do that without murdering someone. All I know is killing. It is all I'll never know."

Bonnie shook her head. "No, Jacklyn. It isn't. You're making excuses because you're afraid."

"And you aren't? You nearly died because of me. I nearly die every day. Do you want that, Bonnie?"

Bonnie leaned back against the wall. Jacklyn seemed to have extinguished her anger as quickly as she had lit it. Now she stood there, empty and defeated. Hollow. Bonnie carefully took her hand in her own.

"I am scared, Jacklyn. I'm scared every time you ride off because there might be a time you don't come back. I'm scared that you'll do something stupid and get shot and no will be there to help you. But I'm also scared that I'm going to pass on old and bitter and alone and full of regret."

Jacklyn shook her head vehemently. "No. You're in danger when I'm around and you're in danger when I try to stay away. I can't win and I'm not meant to. The best thing I can do is just get as far away from you as possible."

She leaned forward and took Bonnie's face carefully between her hands. She looked up at her defiantly and never more sure of herself but Jacklyn's visage showed only sadness. She pressed trembling lips against her forehead and stepped away and Bonnie nearly sobbed knowing that the gentleness that this woman, a self proclaimed killer of men, was capable of was reserved for her and her alone and yet she would not know it again.

"Goodbye, Miss MacFarlane."

She passed into the light outside and the door fell closed behind her and Bonnie stayed leaning against the wall and did not leave the dark of the barn.


	10. Chapter 10

Bonnie sat her horse and they both stared out over the wide river, the water the color of mercury. Mexico's coast was lined with sage with the desert beyond white and massive and the distant lavender mountains bright and raw below a sky so filled with stars that Bonnie looked for holes in the heavens and found none. Celestial bodies fell endlessly on their remote journeys to corners of the universe beyond man's reckoning. The waste beyond the Rio Bravo was alien and hostile and seemed to have been called up from the brimstone itself and of forgiveness and mercy it did not know. Bonnie briefly thought of Jacklyn but only briefly. She sat there a while and turned back. She still patrolled alone these days but she always rode with a rifle loaded and readied across her lap and now and then when the night was dark and starless she'd take a dog with her.

In the morning she'd go outside and feed the chickens and check for eggs. After that she helped herd the cattle out to graze and then she'd spend an hour at the barn supervising its reconstruction. At noon she'd watch the ranch hands break horses and pick ones to sell and ones to keep. With the sun beginning its long descent she'd help chase the cattle back home, eat supper with her father, and then patrol. Life went on. Amos mentioned Jacklyn Marston once in passing and she had made sure that he never did it again.

One evening at dinner they were sitting there silently, her and her father. Bonnie ate and drank, carrying out the motions and her father sat there staring at her and though she tried to ignore him she finally got to where she couldn't stand it anymore.

"What, Pa."

He looked down at his supper and took some of it with his fork and then sat there chewing. "Talked to the Marshall the other day, said Bill Williamson ran off to Mexico."

"I heard."

"Said that Marston was going after him."

"Heard that too."

"Bonnie."

"What?"

He set his utensils down and looked at her.

"Pa, I don't want to talk about her."

"She's going to Mexico Bonnie."

She leaned her elbows on the table and covered her face with one hand, muffling her voice. "I tried, Daddy. I already told you this."

"Who knows when she'll end back up in the country. She might not come back. Lots of bad blood down there. Plenty of Americans end up face down in a ditch for no reason at all."

"Father."

"I'm just saying. It's a violent land."

"I know. But please just drop it."

He did and Jacklyn wasn't spoken of again, and a few weeks later there was still no mention of her. Bonnie had heard of her though, down in Mexico. Those southern foreigners often traveled through on the train and they spoke of a woman dressed all in black. Some said she was boon to the revolution while others spoke of her as a mercenary hired by Alende to crush the common folk in a show of tyranny and there seemed to be no agreement on either her goodness or wickedness.

And then she returned with no fanfare, no warning or rumor. Bonnie walks out her front door and she's sitting on her horse in front of her home, looking faded and tired. No expression on her darkened face. Mexico had been cruel to her these past weeks. Bonnie crossed her arms and leaned against a post on her porch.

"Well, you're alive."

Jacklyn nodded and there was the faintest lift of her lips at the very corner of her mouth. "So it seems."

"What are you doing back here?"

Jacklyn dismounted. She took one step towards her but kept her distance, hands stuck in her coat pockets at the edge of the road. "I happened to be in the country."

"You catch Bill Williamson yet?"

Jacklyn shook her head. "No ma'am."

She took another step forward and shifted back on her heel. She looked over the ranch and back at the freshly painted barn and tilted her head at it. "Looks good."

"Thanks. How you like Mexico?"

"Well, pardon me ma'am, but I've never been in a more hellish place."

Bonnie nodded. "I don't doubt it. Pa says that's a vicious land."

"Everything and everyone tries to kill me down there I'm afraid."

Bonnie nearly grinned in spite of herself, the anger she'd felt for the woman dull. "You know any Spanish?"

"Only enough to tell when they're about to shoot me."

"That's all you really need to know."

Jacklyn smiled back at her. One more step. She looked down at her feet. Bonnie chewed her lip and there was silence between them.

"Jacklyn?"

She looked back up at her, peering out under her hat. "Yes, Miss MacFarlane?"

"Why'd you really come back?"

Jacklyn swallowed. There was about five feet between them now. Bonnie hadn't moved. "I needed to apologize."

Bonnie sighed and looked down, her blush a mask across her face. "Don't worry about it. I understand."

"Ma'am. I've done a lot of terrible things in my life. I'll always be a killer. I could quit right this second and I'll still be one til the day I die. It has marked me and I'll never escape it. I've wronged many people, many people have wronged me, but Bonnie, just one goddamn time, I'd like to do something right."

Bonnie hadn't realized how close she was until she looked up and saw that she could see the intensity in Jacklyn's eyes. She could see all the scars on her face, the old ones and some new ones. She could smell her. Dust and leather and wildflowers and now something akin to iron, a blood smell, and then she felt heat in her chest, and felt softness when she buried her hands in Jacklyn's hair and pulled her mouth down to hers. When they leaned away they stayed close, still touching. Bonnie waited for Jacklyn to pull away but she did not even though there was worry on her face.

"Bonnie, I can't make any promises. I can't. It isn't fair to you or me. I need you to understand that."

"I understand."

"Alright."

"Do you?"

"No promises." Bonnie repeated the words back to her but didn't look to be convinced. She was here, right in front of her, and even a promise of no promises was a promise in and of itself.

"Would you like to come inside for a drink, Miss Marston?"

"I'd like that, Miss MacFarlane."

* * *

Epilogue

A navy predawne over the desert. To the east a scarlet glow lined the tops of the mountains and cast their shadows for miles and miles over the barren country. There were blue and red and orange layered canyons all around and herds of white horses ran pale like death in the shroud of the morning. A creature scampered across the scrub and a gunshot rang out and it squealed and stilled. Its hunter picked it up by the hind legs and held it before her face. A lean desert hare, mostly fur and bone. She took it back to her frail fire in the shadowed alcove of a huge structure of rock and blackened the little meat it had. This was all she had eaten in days.

She was on the run. At her heels were soldiers and there were also rebels and when they weren't killing each other they were hunting her. In her focused mission to capture Williamson she had blindly and foolishly disregarded the fact that one simply couldn't be on both sides. It was time to pick one and hope they wouldn't shoot her for treason after it was all said and done.

If Bonnie were here, she'd shake her head and call her a jackass.

That was all she allowed herself to think of her. She made no promises and she forced that rule to apply to herself as well. She would have to move again soon.

Her golden stallion watched her as she approached. She saddled him and mounted and loped to a low hill of vantage. The mercenaries sent by De Santa were about two hours behind her if they had ridden through the night like she had. Given the bounty on her head, she didn't doubt it. Regardless, even while looking death in the eyes, she thought briefly of blonde hair and a cocky smirk and she smiled, her bleeding lips cracking and the pain doing nothing to erase these rare and pleasant thoughts of a simpler life.


End file.
